Yep, still chairless over here, so still only sporadic reviewing. New review today for Concerted Efforts by Mohar Kalra, and once again I’ll try to get another crouching review or two up during the week.

Sometimes I receive books from people who say they’re just starting out in comics, and in those cases I really try to put my professional reviewer’s hat on (whatever that means), to get ready to get picky about little errors or basic things that the artist could do to improve. When I do this I try to make it clear that despite the number of comics I’ve read in my life, I’m still just some guy, and the opinion of people like me should never dissuade anybody from making comics. That being said… this comic was pretty great. The pacing, the story, the interplay of sound effects with the action, I don’t have a negative thing to say about any of it. I guess I wish he would have put up a link on his website where people could buy a physical copy of this comic, but maybe that’s just me showing my age, as he has it up for free if you’re curious. This is the story of Mohar going to his first concert (I learned this for sure on his website). First he has to motivate himself to attend, as going to any concert is a big hassle. Once he gets there he’s supposed to meet up with a friend, but his friend got there early and had made his way to the front. Mohar, however, as you can see from the sample image, had quite a journey ahead of him to meet his friend. I loved the descriptions of the different sections of the crowd (familiar to anybody who’s been to a big show), the wise old concert-goer who offered to help, the rage when people realized he wasn’t dancing… lots of great little touches in here. Overall I’d recommend this book to anybody who’s ever had to navigate a big concert crown. As far as any practical advice I might have? Keep doing what you’re doing, try to get in some diverse life experiences so you have interesting stories to tell, and you’ll be just fine.

Yep, I’m finally back! But it wouldn’t be me if there wasn’t drama along the way: I have no chair for my computer desk, so I’m awkwardly typing this while sitting on the floor. Meaning reviews might be scarce for a bit until I get this sorted and, due to getting hit with a few hilarious financial setbacks after moving, that might be a few weeks. But I’ll still get sporadic reviews up, like the one today for Noble Head Funnies #6 by Edward Parker Bolman, another of the Poopsheet Foundation subscription comics, so look into that, won’t you? Meanwhile, if you live near the Columbus area in Ohio and have a decent computer chair you’re looking to get rid of, let me know and I can trade you for some comics…

Boy howdy, this comics takes you on quite a journey. This is the first comic I’ve seen from Edward Bolman (and Poopsheet has quite a knack for publishing artists with little to no web presence, so no help there) so I had no idea what to expect. As usual, I’ll try to sum it up in my own vague, trying-not-to-give-anything-away way and, as usual, it’ll be up in the air as to whether or not I did more to help than harm. There are a number of distinct story nuggets in here, but most of them end up circling back around to the main story. Or maybe they all do and I missed it? Anyway, the main story deals with a dinner party in which the only 400 people in the city were scheduled to attend. But when one guest arrives she notices that the place is empty. She makes a call to complain, she is herself taken away, and the mystery is afoot! But the focus of the comic wanders to a few different areas after (and before) that, including a trampoline jump contest, chlurm, spiders and gorilla men, the moon kicking sand in the devil’s face, time travel with past issues, and a lovely dance. Oh, and let’s not forget the sassy nibbler. Edward also has quite the lyrical turn of phrase; if you know him I’d highly recommend that you get Patrick Stewart to narrate the comic as you read it. It kept me guessing and was hilarious at times, so I’d say that’s more then enough to recommend it to you discerning readers. $3, or check with Poopsheet about the monthly comics subscription program.

New review today for Goiter #2 by Josh Pettinger, and I’m moving to the new apartment this weekend: 13 E. Winter St. Apt 1, Delaware, OH 43015. Send comics, I’m running low on review issues so there won’t be much lag time. If there’s a gap in reviews, it’s most likely because something has gone wrong with getting the internet working at the new place. That happens almost every time, so don’t be too alarmed if it happens this time too.

Previously on this review website, I mentioned wondering how Josh would follow up the first issue of Goiter. It turns out that the second issue doesn’t have much to do with the first (or does it and I missed it? Always possible!), but it is a step up in quality. Not that the quality of the first issue was poor, but Josh has a lot more room to play around with panel structure, silent moments, and a mystery. None of which are mentioned on the cover, although I guess there is a death. Um, spoiler alert. I always say that part too late. Anyway, this is the story of Henry Kildare, a ventriloquist from Chicago who’s stopped at a small town to play a gig. He tries several times to contact a missing girlfriend (or at least a girlfriend who doesn’t want to speak to him), gets several comments about Chicago from people who have obviously never been there, has a middling to bad show and takes mushrooms with the bartender. Things take a real turn after that, as he gets stuck in the middle of a missing persons case, and this is probably the part where I should stop talking about the story. The rest of it, including the ending, is delightfully enigmatic, with all kinds of room for interpretation if you’re so inclined. Both issues of Goiter were delightful in their own mildly unnerving way, so here’s hoping Josh keeps putting out Goiters for us all to enjoy!

New review today for The Last Human Alive by Joseph Hewitt. The reviews this week are all done in advance because of my upcoming move, so my apologies if the world ended in the meantime. I mean, only if I’m somehow responsible for it, of course. The unchecked power of a small comics review website can be an awesome thing to behold.

Nuclear war has come, and the only thing to survive (apparently) was a small group of voles. Unless I missed an issue or two where this was explained in more detail, that is. As you may have guessed from the title, the voles think they’ve spotted a human, the creature that they all know was responsible for the end of the world. Do they mind the end of the world since they’re now basically in charge of it? Unknown! The voles react to this news in different ways, with most of them forming an army to take out the human before it takes them out. One of them goes off to see a village elder of sorts, who tells the story of how the world ended, mostly by using the word “ass” a lot (yes, it’s still a coherent and concise explanation). Right around the halfway point of the book, the army confronts the human that they’ve spotted, with the rest of the issue being a desperate battle against it. Sort of. Look, if I cleared it up I’d take away the mystery, and who wants that? It’s a fun story, with Joseph once again providing the Korean translation at the back of the book for interested parties. At this rate I figure I’ll be able to write Korean in… never. Still just about never. But if you have a passing familiarity with it, maybe this will refresh your memory. If you only speak Korean and have stumbled across this review (by some hilariously garbled Google translator, no doubt), you’re in luck! $5

L. has been making comics for quite a few years now (go check the archives here if you don’t believe me, although I really wish the years of the reviews still showed up), but this might be the best thing he’s ever done. Granted, I’d have to go back and read several old issues of Jumbly Junkery to be sure… you know what, I should probably do that anyway. Anyway, Flocks is the story of his life. L. was gender assigned as female at birth and raised by a strictly religious family. Meaning that when she (at the time; please forgive me if I mess up the pronouns and/or correct me so I don’t do it again) was growing up and started to get feelings that didn’t coincide with the feelings church/her family/her school told her that she should be getting, L. had nowhere to turn for better advice. Instead she had crippling self-doubt, what seemed at times to be an inner loathing as she tried to make herself behave the way she was supposed to and like who she was supposed to. L. spares no detail in Flocks, and the details are almost uniformly grim. She did have supportive parents in other areas (specifically scholastic), and she did have supportive teachers, but it wasn’t until she was able to go away in her later high school years that she was able to start to put it all together. It’s a riveting and heartbreaking journey, and he seems to have arrived at a moment now where all is right with the world: loving wife, two kids, happy in his own skin, he even finally found a church that was supportive and loving instead of the hateful mess he had growing up. I guess all that constitutes a spoiler, but since we’re dealing with L.’s life, I thought it was allowed. For anybody out there is struggling with who they are, this comic will speak to you in a profound way. This is especially true if you’re in one of the backwaters of America or anywhere around the world where intolerance is still considered the right way to be. Whatever you’re going through, it can all work out; it’s just a matter of getting through the rough parts first. $21.95

While I was looking up Edie’s website I chanced upon some artwork he has for sale, and was once again reminded that I’m not wealthy enough to appreciate fine art. Sigh. If you have money lying around, some of those pieces are absolutely incredible and you should buy one. Or buy me one; I’m certainly not proud enough to reject it. Hi, you’re here to read about this graphic novel, and here I am complaining. If you’re familiar with Edie’s work you probably already do and do not know what to expect, as he manages to shock and amaze me every time out at least a few times. It’s no different with this collection, and once again I’m going to try to encapsulate what cannot be… capsulated. That can’t be right. Stories in here deal with an alphabet snake and its quest for a body, its trip to the convenience store, some of the sexiest food prep you ever will see, more food prep but this time with a sense of existential panic, the pumpkin’s revenge fantasies, gender fluidity in said pumpkin, what you might see if you peek through a window while someone has their pants down, fucking with venereal leeches, trying to get blood from tiny veins and using it in serving sizes, and sexy cow milking. Also about a dozen other stories, if not more, and the descriptions I already gave you are almost certainly wrong at points. Yep, this is another case where you’ll have to buy it for yourself to see what I messed up. Luckily reading this will most likely make you a better person, so it’s worth the money from your end. Unless nudity and sex scares you, in which case get thee to a church as soon as possible and away from this book. For the rest of us, there’s plenty here to enjoy. $21.95

Sorry about yet another week without reviews, but you try organizing a move when you have this many comics to sort out. Oh, the problems I have, boo-hoo, woe is me. But yeah, if you want to send more comics for review, at this point I’d just hold off until I post the new address where I’ll be living on July 1st. New review today for Andros #7 by Max Clotfelter!

I just got lost for a minute trying to count the faces in that cover. Go ahead, try it yourself! This is another collection of short pieces by Max, mostly (if not entirely) pulled from small anthology comics. And since I do this “for a living” (i.e. make no money but keep doing it anyway) and haven’t seen most of these stories before, I’m guessing you haven’t either. The strip I sampled sums up my general mood on America in the middle of 2018; if you’re reading this in the future, the main subject of controversy right now is prison camps for immigrant children. Check around to see if things have gotten better or worse since this moment! Other strips deal with the steps Max has taken throughout the years to make himself almost entirely disguised, a few FEMA funnies strips, the story of a dog breeder who had some creative methods for convincing others that his dogs were pure bred, an alarming double page spead pinup of his Aunt from the 60’s, the time that he learned a valuable lesson about bullying, and a few other short pieces that I’ll leave as mysteries. Hey Secret Acres, Max is bound to have enough strips around by now to warrant a collection of his work. You’re on a roll with what you’ve been putting out, maybe give his stuff a shot? For you, gentle reader, yes, I’d recommend giving this a shot. I’ve been reviewing his stuff almost since I started this website in 2001, and it’s still an unnerving delight every time I see it. $2

More and more, Dan’s books defy any sort of conventional analysis and, more and more, reading them makes me want to sit in a corner and think about whether or not reality is really how I see it or how Dan sees it, and what it means if it’s more like Dan’s version. So I’d like to start with a quote from the letter Dan sent me along with this comic; the only background you need to know is that in 2018 I spent some time away from reviewing comics because my back was in excruciating pain pretty much constantly over a few months. “It is too bad that we have to carry around heavy brains wiggling around on top of a frail super-extended spine.” Yes… yes it is. Dan starts off with a long text piece that is on both inside covers, in which he describes the contents of the comic. Sort of, while also leaving plenty of room for your own interpretations, and mentioning several things that don’t seem to happen in the comic itself. Maybe I shouldn’t have read that first, but it was right there on the inside front cover! I had to read that first, right? Anyway, I’ll give this is a shot, fraught with peril though it may be. This is the story of Gerard, who’s an average dude. He gets ice cream with sprinkles, then decides that he wants rainbow tears. A Rascal is brought into the mix, then burnt orange wax. Suddenly, a ramp and a crash! Mortality sets in, and is begrudgingly welcomed. All that is needed after that is a golden coin. Huh. It’s only with Dan’s comics that I’m genuinely not sure if I spoiled the ending, or how much it would matter if I did. His comics are about the journey, not necessarily the destination, except that’s probably not what they’re about, and I’ll never know fully what they’re about, as I’m me and not Dan. Sometimes I hope that Dan’s comics are all that survives after the (choose your own favorite type of) apocalypse happens. I’d love to see the world that aliens would put together using only the information contained in these 23 issues. $5

I guess there are probably a few people out there in the world whose lives have never been touched by any sort of depression or mental illness (either their own or that of loved ones). I mean, it must have happened out there somewhere, right? But for the rest of us, who will never forget the sight of _____, or the sound of _____ as _____ (details removed to protect anybody from figuring out any real part of the scarring events mentioned), either mental illness or the aftereffects of it will always be around. This is Katherine’s story of her 2015, spent in a psych ward and/or trying to figure out effective types of medication. She says that the images in here are the sum total of her artistic output from that year, as she tried to figure out reasons for staying alive, to live, to make it through each day. She mentions other people in the same ward (all names removed, of course, although she says it’s because she can’t remember any of them) and their troubles, the difficulty in trying to relax when somebody checks on you literally every 15 minutes every single day, and the slow realization that every single thing in her room was designed to prevent someone from hurting themselves. Saying something is “deeply personal” has maybe been overused over the years, but it’s hard to imagine a more deeply personal book than this. She talks frankly about every aspect of this process, before and after, and refuses to plaster any sort of happy ending onto it. Mental illness is a constant struggle and she doesn’t sugar coat it, although I am glad that she knows of Maria Bamford (who talks frankly about thinking of killing herself in her act but somehow remains hilarious). If you have any of these issues yourself, or know somebody who does, I honestly can’t recommend this book enough. It’s mostly text, and it’s riveting; don’t go into this expecting a normal comic where you get to relax with laugh lines here and there. I’m sitting here now and thinking of more lines that cut right to the core of me or broke my heart a little, so I’d better end it now. Get a copy of this, and then do what I’m going to do: loan it out to loved ones, but don’t be pushy about it. A lot of people could be helped by what’s in between these covers. $7

For any artists out there who have been daunted by Caitlin’s productivity, especially considering the amount of research she has to do for most of her comics, but were perhaps selfishly holding out hope that maybe she wasn’t funny: sorry, this comic should kill off that hope for you. And really, you should be worried more about your own work than comparing yourself to others. That’s just common sense! This is a collection of 50 strips about humans in some sort of peril; more often than not the peril is existential, but there’s some physical danger thrown in here and there as well. These are all single panel strips, mostly reminiscent of New Yorker strips, but funnier than the average example of that type than I’ve usually seen. And bleak as hell, mostly, so adjust your expectations accordingly if you’re expecting a wacky laugh riot full of outlandish hijinx. Subjects include… ugh, is there anything worse than describing the basic outline of single panel jokes? I might as well be telling you where the punchline is heading for verbal jokes. Subjects include ennui, dissatisfaction at the state of the universe and your place in it, an unwillingness to disconnect from the virtual world to join the actual world, the futility of engaging with reality with forced cheer, and kittens falling asleep. One of those things is not discussed in this book of strips, but I’ll leave it to you to suss out which one was the lie. $6